USS Princeton disaster

The USS Princeton disaster occurred on 28 February 1844 when a bow gun aboard USS Princeton exploded during a cannon salute to George Washington's home of Mount Vernon, Virginia, killing 6 and wounding 20. President John Tyler and 400 other guests, including several cabinet members, notable politicians, and their families, had boarded the USS Princeton at Alexandria for a cruise down the Potomac River so that its captain, Robert F. Stockton, could demonstrate the power of the US Navy, of which Tyler had been a strong supporter. The ship fired a cannon salute to Mount Vernon as it passed by, and the guests viewed the first set of cannon firings before havng dinner. Secretary of the Navy Thomas Walker Gilmer then asked Stockton to fire the largest cannon, the Peacemaker, and urged the guests to come and watch. Tyler was going to observe the cannon, but, when he heard his son-in-law whistling his favorite American Revolutionary War-era song, Tyler decided to forego witnessing the gunfire and instead decided to listen to the song, which he had not heard since his boyhood. Meanwhile, Stockton had the cannon fired, but the gun burst due to its left side failing, spraying shrapnel into the crowd. Gilmer, Secretary of State Abel P. Upshur, the ship's captain, Maryland politician Virgil Maxcy, New York politician David Gardiner, and Tyler's black valet Armistead. Another 20 people, including US Senator Thomas Hart Benton and Stockton, were injured. Tyler found Gardiner's daughter, his 24-year-old crush Julia, and carried the unconscious Julia off the ship, earning her trust and leading to the now-orphaned Julia seeing Tyler as her new provider and agreeing to marry him. The disaster temporarily derailed the United States' efforts to annex the Republic of Texas, which was merely awaiting Upshur's signature; Texan ambassador Isaac Van Zandt feared that his replacement would not be as skilled as Upshur, and he was correct: the next Secretary was John C. Calhoun.